Exclusive vs. Non-Exclusive

[mazz]

Hi all,

This topic has been coming up a lot lately and also I had the opportunity to hear about this from some of the bigger libraries recently and thought I'd weigh in on it.

In my experience, most non-exclusive deals are also re-titling, where the library creates a "derivative work" simply by giving your piece a different title. Now they control the publishing for that music under that title, but the exact same music can still be marketed to other libraries under a completely different title with that other library also controlling the publishing (same music, different title)!!

I've also seen contracts where the music is signed to be exclusive in the markets that the library competes in but the piece can still be sold by the artist on their CD (itunes, etc.). This seems OK to me as long as the artist is going to be on the ball enough to refer any requests for licensing the music (someone hears it on itunes and wants to sync it, for instance) to the library that owns the rights for synchronization.

Then there's exclusive, which is totally fine with me. (Keep in mind that I'm an instrumental composer with an ever expanding catalog of music, not a songwriter with a much smaller catalog. I'm not going to speak to that because it's a different kettle of fish altogether, IMO.)

With exclusivity, both the composer and the library have more skin in the game. The library is probably more picky so if you get in, you're smarter than the average bear, and the library owner places more value on their catalog because you can't get this stuff anywhere else. That's good for everyone, even the clients, because they would also like to think they're getting something special. Everyone likes to think they're special, right? You can't go to some online library that takes anyone and find this quality of music. That's what makes it special. (the next level up is getting hired by a library to create a collection for them, which means they have even more motivation to push your stuff!!) Remember, a lot of these libraries have excellent relationships directly with supervisors at networks, etc. They also have a quality standard to uphold and having pieces that no one else has is a great selling point.

At the beginning of my foray into library music, I signed a few pieces with a couple of different places, but I started looking into it more and talking to composer friends and discussions here and elsewhere, and I made the decision to treat every non-exclusive deal as an exclusive deal. I intend to write several hundred pieces of music in my career so it's more important to me to have a diversified catalog in several excellent libraries than it is to have a small number of pieces in lots of libraries at the same time.

Let's not forget watermarking and fingerprinting technology that is right around the corner. Whatever technology gets generally adopted, it will be possible to detect any piece of music by it's unique signature, which will obviate re-titling, because that piece of music is really just one entity, not a bunch of titles referring to the same music. Re-titling will eventually go out the window, I predict.


So what value do you place on your music? You might actually be doing yourself and your library clients a disservice by placing your pieces in several libraries at one time because it will end up competing against itself and instead of making a nice sync fee, it might lose out to itself to a lower priced library. Same piece gets lower price because it's in more than one library? Doesn't make good business sense to me.

Think about it.

Let's talk this out.

Cheers!

Mazz

[Kolstad]

(Keep in mind that I'm an instrumental composer with an ever expanding catalog of music, not a songwriter with a much smaller catalog. I'm not going to speak to that because it's a different kettle of fish altogether, IMO.)

WHAT!!!??? Are you saying songwriters has smaller d.. eeh catalogs??

So what value do you place on your music? You might actually be doing yourself and your library clients a disservice by placing your pieces in several libraries at one time because it will end up competing against itself and instead of making a nice sync fee, it might lose out to itself to a lower priced library. Same piece gets lower price because it's in more than one library? Doesn't make good business sense to me.

Well, I haven't gotten into the legal stuff just yet, and haven't been submitting much as Im just getting there, but the business side is not my best, so it's really useful to me to read your thoughts and experiences with this.

As the rookie, I don't plan discussing contracts all that much. And I would think I don't want to pursue a piece once it's placed in a library, at first. I am writing songs too, and the output from both is putting a limit to the time I have for negotiating and pitching.

Of course, I attend to the important stuff, and this business is not for the naïve, but paying too much attention to single pieces is really not an option either, as it often is quicker just to write a new one.. even for songs.

What's important for me is to build some good relations. I tend to have a short attention span with business, so if I can get my work in good enough shape to get contracts, I would probably not drift too much beyond the number of relations you can count on one hand. At least not at a time. Im sort of a go-to guy, who easily get into a comfort zone.

I understand the dangers of that, but Im thinking maybe it's not all that bad, after reading your take on working the markets. It's my experience you easily say 'yes' to too much, and end up with very little.. I guess your point is that the same goes for contracts

[Hookjaw Brown]

I am the 'singer/songwriter' class of composers. My goal is performance and publication for sale. BUT...there are plenty of shorts, instrumentals and musical ideas that I specifically work on for submission to film and advertising. My catalog is small, but like a garden, is growing. I only submit to one library at a time, if they like me I can do repeat business. If I submit the same piece many times I am afraid I will irritate someone.

I have the problem that my finished songs that I like to perform and publish do not meet the requested idioms. A lot of my short instrumentals do, and once I have them fluffed up, will submit.

Speaking of submissions...does anyone submit to Sonicbids?

le Hook

[Tree]

Thanks Mazz for the info. This is something that at first we were all gung-ho to submit to as many libraries as possible, now the more we're talking to other composers it makes a lot of sense to limit it to just one, or maybe 2 that are in completely different markets. Do you do that at all?

Do any of you do variations of a song so you can submit the same general song to different libraries? Change the tempo, melody or something of the sort?

Hook, I've had on my list of things to do to get more involved in Sonic Bids. I have a profile setup but haven't gone through the steps of looking at the listings and submitting anything. I'm curious as well if anyone else has any experience with this.

Theresa

[guscave]

Hey Mazz,
Great post. I’ve been wrestling myself on this same topic for several months. I don’t have 100’s of songs available yet, but hope to get there soon. The question that I keep asking though is, “if in fact re-titling & non-exclusives deals are going to be sort of “killed off” once watermarking or some audio recognition system gets put in place by the PRO’s, why do so many libraries (both old & new) continue to do it”?

Many of these libraries that offer non-exclusive deals are run by folks that have been in the business for a very long time. Not your average “Johnny come lately”… Some are actually Taxi clients.

[mazz]

I honestly don't know why they still do it but I venture to guess that it's two things: 1. momentum 2. they haven't gotten up to speed totally with the rumblings in the business.

There's an organization called the Production Music Association (PMA) and they are discussing this fairly extensively. Most of the biggest libraries are members of PMA, but not all of the big libraries are, and many of the smaller ones aren't either. So it will take a while for all of this to shake out, but it will also be driven by the clients. I've heard that some of the networks are starting to refuse to work with libraries that re-title. I think it took the networks and their legal departments a while to catch on to the whole re-titling thing as well and I'd be willing to bet that an issue came up with a piece of music coming from two different sources at some big network production. If the customers don't like it, then you can bet that the libraries will stop doing it eventually.

The production music world is really smaller than you think and eventually word will get around about this. My only hope is that there will be some agreement on which digital identification technology becomes the standard. There seems to be some movement toward a MetaData standard and I hope that the watermarking or fingerprinting issue gets ironed out as well. All of these things will be beneficial to the composer because eventually close to 100% of the performances will be trackable.

It's in a state of flux right now, but I firmly believe that the chips will fall on the side of the exclusive libraries. What that will do, as well, is it will make it a bit harder to get in and it will make us all work harder to up our game. In the "old days" before everyone and their 13 year old nephew with Garageband could call themselves a "composer" or "artist", you actually had to be able to play and compose to get a deal. I like the new technologies and how they enable a lot of participation in music by folks that wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity, but chops and skill still need to be developed and hopefully this will raise the bar for entry into the library music field. Call me a stick in the mud, but going back to more of an exclusive business model will separate out the pros from the hobbyists and turn down the "noise" that's out there right now with these libraries that take anything and everything.

Maybe my blood sugar is low! Time for lunch, my attitude needs some adjusting!

Mazz

[Tree]

The digital identification does get tricky. I'm sure it will get better though.

I know some of the networks not taking re-titles anymore is also so viewers can find out who songs are by. Fans search online for the lyrics in a song and if it was a re-title it would make it much harder to find who the song is by.

Thanks for the info on The PMA, I had no idea a group like this existed. Good to know though.

If we went back to more exclusive deals it would help not only raise the bar but also the price of music. It's dropping so low because every desperate composer is willing to take anything just to get their foot in the door. (me included)

I'm curious to see how the newly forming composers union will change things for us too.

[mazz]

The composer's union is a good idea, but it's not really geared toward library composers at the moment. It's mostly the Hollywood film composers who are trying to get organized. I wish them well, they are getting hammered by runaway production, etc. I'm sure a part of their frustration is library music, but really there's only a very few composers in Hollywood getting the high end films and there's a big gap between those folks and the next rung down. It's a fairly exclusive club at the moment.

Library composers can help each other by doing as you say and not devaluing their work. It's hard to do because sync fees are few and far between these days, just more indication of the diminishing value being placed on music as a result of a glut of music being offered. But the best libraries will still be able to get some sync fees because they provide top quality music that can't be found elsewhere. Those are the libraries to be in, and the bar is high both musically and relationship-wise to get in there. I like that high bar personally, it feels like a reward for all the time and effort I've put into my music and business. If I can get in with those folks, I've really accomplished something.

OK, back to work!

Mazz

[eeoo]

Hey good thread here. Could somebody take a sec and give me a crash course on re-titling and how it benefits music libraries? Thank you! eo.

[guscave]

Hey good thread here. Could somebody take a sec and give me a crash course on re-titling and how it benefits music libraries? Thank you! eo.

When a library offers you a non-exclusive deal they are aware that you are going to offer the same music to other libraries. So what they do is register the song with the PRO's under a new (re-titled) name. This way if their pitch on your song earns any broadcast royalties, they'll get paid for the publishing share.

This would probably not be a big problem if broadcasters would fill out cue sheets properly (IE: showing the correct publisher, writer, time etc.).